Free The Toyminator by Robert Rankin Page B

had in it. Not a lot, he concluded, not a lot.
    “A lovely night for a drive,” he said.
    “Then drive me to a show.”
    “A puppet show?” Jack asked. “A Punch and Judy show?”
    “A proper show at a proper club. Let’s go to Old King Cole’s.”
    “Ah,” said Jack, as Eddie had done whilst speaking to Chief Inspector Bellis.
    “You’re not ashamed to be seen with me, are you?” asked Amelie.
    “No,” said Jack. “Not at all. Anything but. If it’s Old King Cole’s you want, then Old King Cole’s you shall have.”
    “You are such a sweetie.” Amelie leaned over and kissed Jack on the cheek. A delicate kiss, a sensuous kiss. Just like a re –
    “Old King Cole’s it is,” said Jack.
     
    Now Old King Cole was indeed a merry old soul and when he wasn’t writing self-help manuals, which was all of the time nowadays as he’d only written the one, he could mostly be found at his jazz club, a rather swank affair on Old King Cole Boulevard, a place where one came to be seen.
    Old King Cole had long ago sacked his fiddlers three in favour of a more up-beat ensemble: a clockwork trio, comprised of a saxophonist, drummer and piano player. There had been a brief period when he had toyed with a twelve-piece cymbal-playing monkey ensemble, but in the end had considered it rather too avant-garde, preferring a more traditional sound. The sound of Jazz.
    Now jazz is jazz. You either love jazz or you hate it. There is no middle ground with jazz and it’s no good saying you like
some
jazz. Liking
some
jazz is not
loving jazz
. All right, neither is it
hating jazz
, but that is not the point. To truly love jazz you have to have a passion for it. You have to be able to get right inside it, to feel it, to … blah blah blah blah and so on and so forth and suchlike.
    Old King Cole loved jazz. Before the passing of the infamous Edict Five, which had dispensed with royalty in Toy City, he had been King of Toy City and with him jazz had reigned supreme. After the ousting of the now infamous mad mayor, he was royalty once more and although jazz had never truly reigned supreme (in anyone’s opinion other than his own) it was back at the top with him, as far as he was concerned, and if you are King you can believe whatever you want because few will dare to contradict you.
    Old King Cole’s jazz club was grand. It was stylish. It was magnificent. This was no gaudy piece of flash, this was old money spent well, the work of master builders.
    It had been constructed to resemble a vast grand piano, atop it a gigantic candelabra, its candles spouting mighty flames. A liveried doorman, in a plush swaddle-shouldered snaff jacket with cross-stitched underpinnings and fluted snuff trumbles, stood to attention before double doors that twinkled with carbustions of cremmily, jaspur and filigold, made proud with Pultroon finials and crab-handle “Jerry” turrets, after the style of Gondolese, but without the kerfundles.
    On his feet the liveried doorman wore crab-toed Wainscotter boots in the trumped end-loungers style and [8]
    On his head he wore a bowler hat.
    Jack cruised up in Bill’s automobile, leaned out from his open window and bid the liveried doorman a good evening.
    The liveried doorman viewed Jack down the length of his nose. A nose that had been considerably lengthened by the addition of an ivorine nasal Kirby-todger. [9]
    Above his moustache.
    “Good evening to you, sir,” said he, raising a richly ornamented glove, richly ornamented with … [10] ornaments. “The valet will park your car for you, your lordship. Kindly leave the keys with me.”
    “Splendid,” said Jack, and he climbed from the car.
    Amelie the dolly did likewise.
    The liveried doorman stiffened slightly, in the manner of one who is suddenly taken aback. One who has seen something troubling.
    Jack turned towards Amelie, who was struggling to pull down the hem of her minuscule skirt, which appeared rather keen to remain where it